“All organisations are perfectly designed to get the results that they get” (Arthur Jones, probably)
What government organisations get is hierarchy, slow and often unresponsive decision cycles and a sense that government is done to people, rather than with them, still less by them. There are – or were – some very real strengths in a Weberian rationalist bureaucracy, but Weber was writing a century ago for a very different world. Adaptation is as crucial for organisational evolution as it is for natural evolution – without it, organisations become less and less well fitted to their environment and eventually fail. But that failure can be long drawn out and painful to all concerned.
This essay is about spotting – and encouraging – new approaches to public administration, better suited to new requirements and new contexts.